Posted
by
Soulskill
on Thursday November 12, 2009 @09:39AM
from the rename-it-to-proceed-with-caution dept.

Norsefire writes "Since releasing the 'Go' programming language on Tuesday, Google has been under fire for using the same name as another programming language that was first publicly documented in 2003. 'Go!' was created by Francis McCabe and Keith Clark. McCabe published a book about the language in 2007, and he is not happy. He told InformationWeek in an email: 'I do not have a trademark on my language. It was intended as a somewhat non-commercial language in the tradition of logic programming languages. It is in the tradition of languages like Prolog. In particular, my motivation was bringing some of the discipline of software engineering to logic programming.'"

It's actually pretty funny Google itself didn't see this coming. Results in Google for go programming language [google.com] are about the existing Go! language and the main developers book about it.

In this case Google should really change the name since its been used in an existing programming language for years. But maybe they are:

"We recently became aware of the Go! issue and are now looking into the matter further," a company spokesperson said in an e-mail.

I don't know what they need to look into. There are only two real aspects to look at here. First, from a technical standpoint, it could confuse people want to learn Google's Go and end up learning the other Go. From a legal standpoint, if the guy didn't trademark the name, who cares? He doesn't really have a case. But it does kind of fly in the face of the "Don't be evil" slogan.

If they want to be nice, they could just rename it to something like Go++ or Go2.

Not really. There was no malice here anywhere. Nobody tried to be evil, nobody is trying to be evil this moment and nobody is trying to be evil in the future.

Some dude had an idea a couple years back that was so utterly obscurethat no Wikipedia page existed for it. Let that sink in: There's a page on Wikipedia for every actor that was ever seen in the background of any Star Trek episode; yet this supposed "Go language" was so unknown that nobody ever bothered to make a page for it (until yesterday). And t

I didn't mean to say that Google is evil for stealing this guy's name. I was merely stating that this could become a PR nightmare if it becomes a big enough deal.

Imagine the spin that could be placed here:Some poor computer programmer invented a programming language with the hope of making the world a better place and here comes the big bad evil corporation Google and steals the name of this language. When the poor chap brings it up, the door is slammed on his face and Google uses the name anyway. This p

Because BasilBrush hath declared it so. To hell with reality and a presented example that happens to be the most well known google service next to search.

Gmail was leaked pre-alpha, announced alpha, announced beta with invites, leaked in press releases several times and then announced again after invites, and finally announced once more at public release.

Google milks all the press and buzz it can with every service even when it is only thinkin

In this case Google should really change the name since its been used in an existing programming language for years.

Why? Go! is just another hobby language that's only been around for a few years. The only thing it has generated is a few academic papers. There probably have been thousands of those in the past 50 or so years. I see no reason for Google to change the name of its computing language just because there are already one or more programming languages with similar names. As the previous sentence implies, I wouldn't be surprised to find out there there are several programming languages with something very similar.

Just because it is currently a hobby language doesn't mean something popular might be made with it later. That would result in a naming collision for people (which go language?) and a complex legal battle if both products became successful.

Here's what would happen if nobody says anything: Google's Go gets popular and now has trademark weight. Go! hobby language gets popular because basement developer makes new popular app. Google sees this as a threat to trademark and is forced to use legal action.

Of course, the hobby language Go! could dwindle and produce nothing of value but we don't know that yet. He's actually doing everyone a favor by bringing up this topic right now while both languages don't have much weight to defend. It eliminates the possibility of expensive arguments in the future.

Actually gang! is pretty clever. It could be a language built on exception handling. Each exception is a ! and as your pogram is running it just gets thrown !'s from all directions. The trick is to handle all the !'s so as not to interrupt your intended process flow.

If Ken Thompson and Rob Pike were designing it, they probably didn't care about getting fired / marketing implications / public backlash etc. They have a history of choosing provocative names, just look at the plan9 stuff.

I would hate to have you as a boss.Oh you had a bug in you code... YOUR FIRRREED!Oh you tried to come up with a creative name that was taken by some obscure language... YOUR FIRRREED!When brain storming for ideas in the meeting you idea that we all liked had a problem... YOUR FIRREED!

I bet you work for the government or something. People make mistakes. Googling for GO will lead to a lot of results and people know that and Go is used for a lot of help support too. So they probably realized it is such a common word finding a language like it will be like a needle in a haystack.Sure google searches now will probably bring you better results however now that it is news it would effect the Google search criteria.

The way I see it, TM or copyright are really useful so you don't have to demonstrate that you were using that name before... he doesn't have it, so he has to show that he had a book, that the language was published in 2003 with that name, etc.

If Francis McCabe wanted to protect his work he had 6 years in which to do it.
Either he's trying to close the barn door after the horses are gone or he's looking to try to get some sales for his book.
They should have planned better.

Actually he contacted them numerous times prior to launch and they ignored him and pushed to launch anyway. They maliciously took the name.

The man published a book, has published an article on the language, and he is cited around the web. When google announced the launch there was a discussion thread about his language and his attempts to contact google.

Not only have people heard of Go! they were already following the issue.

Google does whatever it damn pleases. The "do no evil" slogan has lost its meaning because Google is convinced that it simply cannot do evil and everything it does is for the good of mankind and everybody else is a heretic anyway.

Google's language is called Go! (with an exclamation mark.) The preexisting language whose existence has been suddenly and rudely revealed is called Go without the exclamation mark. Since ! is the negation operator, the Google's language is Go (Not). People don't seem to realize the full implications of the name.

It originates from the paper by Dijkstra [arizona.edu] where he argued GoTo statements should be banned. That resulted in many structured programming languages main stream computer science. But what is not k

Actually, "Go" is the Japanese name for the game. That's a Romanization, obviously, but is considered phonetically close to the Japanese pronunciation.

Not to sound cranky, but how hard would it be to check the relevant section [wikipedia.org] of the Wikipedia article? Quoting:

In Japan—where it is called go ([glyph that Slashdot won't let through]) or igo ([two more glyphs that Slashdot won't reproduce])—the game became popular at the Japanese imperial court in the 8th century, and among the general public by

I still vote for Goop. Have you ever heard the cliche, "you are what you eat"? I think a corollary might emerge: "you are what you code (in)". Some genius will use Goop to code the first artificially intelligent self-replicating nanobots, and they'll decide we're no more significant than any other raw material and turn us all into....

It is proposed that this article be deleted because of the following concern:
Non notable language. All the sources seem to be papers and a book by the author of the language. Per WP:N, sources should be secondary sources independent of the subject.

Bastard! A little research through a few obscure, un-archived computing journals published in the now defunct USSR would have shown you that I wrote the programming language Ed68c886-6390-4255-813f-48e61f6b0b05 over 25 years ago! The cheek of some people!

What is wrong with people who name new computer languages? Like it or not, google has become a defacto reference for coders. You can't remember the exact syntax of python string concatenation, Google it and see:

And the relevant examples are bunched near the top of the first page. Now try the same for Go:Results 1 - 10 of about 50,000 for Go "string concatenation". (0.20 seconds)Of course none of them are relevant but you can see that Go coders are going to have a much worse Signal/Noise ratio.

The only thing I don't like about the processing language is its name:
Results 1 - 10 of about 45,900 for processing "string concatenation". (0.24 seconds)

Of course it come from a long history of google silly names like 'C'Results 1 - 10 of about 84,300 for C "string concatenation". (0.09 seconds)

I think your post is more an issue of words than of text. Intellectual Property is an umbrella term combining trademarks, copyright, and patents. Even without a registered trademark, I think they'd have a good case that Google is trying to pass off their new language as the original Go.

Even without a registered trademark, I think they'd have a good case that Google is trying to pass off their new language as the original Go.

Actually, unregistered trademarks are valid, too. In North America, the trademark system is a "first to use" system, not a "first to file".

However, the original Go is not a commercial product, so there is no trademark issue. Google will likely consider changing the name just because it's stupid to create a new programming language and give it the same name as an existing one, but trademark won't enter into the discussion.

I always thought one had to register a trademark for it to be valid. I thought the the (tm) mark was for pending trademarks. It looks like I was wrong. [ehow.com]

I think the whole fighting over the "go" name is stupid. Seriously, what kind of idiot would think no one used such a commonly used word, especially since most people would equate a programming language with an action. (Yeah, and someone actually used the word "Action!" as the name of their programming language [wikipedia.org].)

Given that it's the top hit for 'go programming language' on Google, if Google are unaware that it exists then it shows quite how insular they have become - obviously they didn't even think of checking whether anyone else had used the name.

if Google are unaware that it exists then it shows quite how insular they have become - obviously they didn't even think of checking whether anyone else had used the name.

Hey it's not their fault. If only they had access to some sort of computer system that allowed one to quickly examine the internet, a "search engine" if you will, then they might have been able to catch this in time.

Well, releasing a book, without a trademark on the name that you used in the title of the book? Maybe I'm misunderstanding here, but I thought the publisher would at least want a TM on the name if it's used in the title of the book (to prevent any issues down the road)...

Simply using the name in a commercial capacity is enough to get an unregistered trademark. However, the problem is that he is not selling the Go! programming language. If it's not a commercial entity, then trademark doesn't apply.

I've seen this explanation a few times, but none of them say straight out that the guy with the older non-commercial language is going to have to change the name of it. Or if eventually the site is going to be DMCAed or whatever.

DMCA is not an issue, since this is a question of trademark, not copyright.

It seems to me that the only way McCabe could be legally forced to change the name is if trademark law applied, but if trademark law applied, then the mark would be his, since trademark law is "first to use", not "first to file".

Legal questions aside, if Google keeps using the name, then McCabe will have to change his name not for legal reasons, but practical ones.

I'm not sure why you think selling something is a pre-requisite for being able to trademark its name. What is key is that you use the trademark on an ongoing basis and are the first to use it in a particular field.(Amongst other things). Even if you freely give something away you can still trademark its name; all a trademark does is identify a particular product and prevents others with similar products from trading on your good (or bad) name. Google, for example gives away many services for free yet can still own the rights to Google as a servicemark or trademark; depending on whether you consider search a service or a good.

I didn't say he had to be selling it, I said he had to be using it in a commercial capacity. Trademark applies to, well, trade. I might use a certain nickname on an ongoing basis in a particular field, but that doesn't mean I automatically get a trademark on that nickname. It would have to be a mark of trade in order for it to be trademarkable.